The Quality of Forgiveness
by Tracy Diane Miller
Summary: The Paper teaches Gary a lesson about forgiveness.


The Quality of Forgiveness  
  
Summary: This very short story was inspired by "The Quality of Mercy."  
  
Disclaimer: Early Edition characters belong to whoever created them. No copyright infringement intended. No profit is being made. Some of the dialogue that appears in this story is not my own, but belongs to the writer of the Early Edition episode "The Quality of Mercy."  
  
Author: Tracy Diane Miller  
  
E-mail address: tdmiller82@hotmail.com  
  
  
  
The Quality of Forgiveness  
  
  
  
The constant humming from the hospital monitor along with the steady drips of the IV were the only indications that life remained in the deadly still body. He gazed at his friend, fighting back his own tears in witnessing a life that is so dynamic, unconventional, and at times immoral but never dull quieted in a hospital bed. Bandages on Chuck's head testified to the seriousness of his friend's injury. Chuck's blue eyes, usually as sparkling and as deep as the Mediterranean Sea, eyes that twinkled with mischief born from some get rich quick scheme, were closed. The doctors said that they had drained fluid from Chuck's brain in order to save his life, but they cautioned that Chuck teetered between life and death.  
  
Marissa said a prayer. But he asked for forgiveness. It was because of him that Chuck's life hung in the balance. He had answered the call of The Paper in preventing John Hernandez from being mowed down by a truck. However, unbeknowingly, his heroics had precipitated a deadly chain reaction. Hernandez wasn't his run of the mill save, a simple ingrate refusing to spare a kind word for his rescuer. Hernandez was a homicidal maniac bent on revenge, determined to have retribution against the State's Attorney who had put him in prison.  
  
What reason did The Paper have in allowing him to save the life of a killer? Why did The Paper direct him to this traffic accident just so he could spare the life of a psycho?  
  
"What can I say, buddy. You blew it." Chuck had said when he told him about saving Hernandez and enabling the con to fulfill his murderous destiny. Yet, the eternal flame of Marissa's optimism burned despite the unsettling turn of events.  
  
"Why would The Paper have me save a killer?" He asked.  
  
"Well, maybe we don't know everything. Maybe there's more to it." Marissa reasoned.  
  
Why? Maybe there's more to it. These questions plagued him as he rushed towards the courthouse to warn State Attorney Rachel Stone of Hernandez's deadly intentions. Chuck had driven him over to the courthouse, complaining the whole ride over there. However, Chuck had promised to wait for him while he went inside the courthouse and that he would send the cavalry in if Gary weren't back in ten minutes. "I thought you said that you had things to do. You've been whining all the way over here." Gary remarked.  
  
"That's just my MO. You know me, buddy. In the end, I'm always there for you, aren't I?" Chuck reminded.  
  
Gary tried pushing back the onslaught of emotions (grief, fear, and guilt) simultaneously rushing towards him like an avalanche as he continued staring at Chuck's still form. It was true- whining was Chuck's MO just as guilt was Gary's MO. But Gary knew that in the end, Chuck would always be there, always be his best friend and the closest thing to a brother he had ever known.  
  
Chuck hadn't wanted to go to the courthouse today. He had made Chuck go with him. If Chuck died because of him, Gary knew that he would never be able to forgive himself.  
  
Hernandez had been compared to a bloodthirsty animal following his second- degree murder conviction of a man who he hit with a bottle, crushing the victim's skull. Later, when Hernandez held Gary as a hostage, the con admitted that he wished that he could undo the murder, that he could bring his victim back. Hernandez hadn't uttered the word "forgiveness", but the emotion punctuated in his words, no longer angry, but remorseful, suggested that he wished that he could forgive himself, that he wished that could turn back the clock.  
  
In the end, through a strange twist of fate, the killer emerged as a hero saving a boy whose foot was caught on train tracks. Hernandez's heroics, his final but selfless act, cost him his life. Whether John Hernandez found forgiveness during his last moments on earth would remain a mystery.  
  
Chuck survived his ordeal. And Gary, perhaps, discovered that the hardest road to forgiveness is when one has to learn how to forgive oneself. It is this quality of forgiveness, often elusive, that because a never-ending struggle, but offers the sweetest of rewards.  
  
The End. 


End file.
